Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Alcoholics Anonymous History: A.A.'s Twelve Well Springs

Alcoholics
Anonymous HistoryA.A.’s
Twelve Well-Springs

By Dick B.

Copyright 2011 Anonymous. All rights reserved

All
A.A.’s Ideas Were Borrowed, said Bill W.

Early in its founding years,
A.A.’s co-founder Bill Wilson put the torch to the idea that A.A. sprang from
just one source. He said frankly that nobody invented A.A. He said all its
ideas were borrowed. And Dr. Bob broadened the source picture by pointing out
that all the basic ideas came from the Pioneers’ study of the Bible.

Unfortunately, neither co-founder put in writing in one place all the
well-springs that produced the streams in A.A. Perhaps the closest they came
can be found in two A.A. Conference-approved publications of somewhat late
vintage.

The first came from the printing
of Dr. Bob’s last major speech in 1948 which is set forth in The Co-Founders of Alcoholics Anonymous:
Biographical Sketches Their Last Major Talks. The second was a long time in
coming. It appeared in an article Bill wrote for the Grapevine and which was
published in The Language of the Heart.
There Bill focused on three sources—Dr. William D. Silkworth, Professor William
James, and Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker, Jr. He made no mention of the Bible!
Neither publication presented the complete picture.

Consequently commentators, both
favorable to and critical of A.A., have had a field day with discussions of its
roots. Most of them have a number of erroneous concepts so embedded in their
historical approaches that they just never tell it like it is or like it was.
Those who don’t like the Bible say that we left it behind in Akron. Those who
don’t like the Oxford Group say that it taught us more about what not to do
than what to do. And those who don’t like either the Bible or the Oxford Group
have tried to quiet the waters by diverting the stream. They say A.A. is
“spiritual, but not religious” even though any well-informed historian,
scholar, clergyman, and semanticist would probably ask: “And what’s the
difference?” Nobody really knows, said A.A. writer, Mel B. But the distinction
without a difference leaves many in a peaceful, atheistic no man’s land.

The real difference in how we characterize A.A. is that, without a knowledge of
A.A.’s various sources—mostly religious—people quickly make up their own
sources. It’s called “self-made religion.” And A.A.’s co-founder Rev. Sam
Shoemaker pointed out that this self-fabricated stuff leads to all kinds of
nonsense—including “absurd names for God” and “half-baked prayers” as Sam described
them. He told this to AAs at an International Convention!

So it is. Those who have spurned the facts often say that our Creator can be a
tree, or they say that neither the Creator nor the tree is “Conference
Approved.” They often go on to say that you really don’t have to believe in
anything at all. And many AAs just give up on this nonsense, and are inclined
to say, “Don’t analyze,” or “Don’t think and don’t drink,” or “Look for the
similarities and discard the differences.” They may add that the Big Book is
A.A.’s basic text and let it go at that. “The Big Book says it, and that settles
it” is a common A.A. expression. And that leaves us barren, with what the Big
Book says, but mostly what it doesn’t say.

AAs today have seen all mention of the Bible deleted from their basic text.
They’ve seen Jesus Christ mentioned only once, and then as a man whose ideas
are seldom followed. They’ve seen the Creator turned into a higher power which
has been turned into a radiator. At the same time, they hear about prayer and
meditation and haven’t the slightest bit of information as to what those ideas
meant either in earliest A.A. or even in the Big Book and Steps. And certainly
not in the volumes of relevant verses in the Bible. And these were well-known
to the A.A. pioneers in Akron.

Consequently, today’s 12 Steppers are left with bundles of nonsense: Prayer to
a rock? Prayer to a chair or a tree? Meditation as a chant? Meditation as
listening? Praying to what! Chanting to what! Listening to what—a light bulb?
For assistance, they hear there are “helpful books,” but there is no mention of
the Good Book which was the major source for their basic ideas. So said Dr. Bob
himself.

These Twelve A.A. Well-Springs Are Not the Basic
Ideas—Just the Sources

I’ve spent 21 years looking up
the basic ideas. I’ve published at least one book and many articles on each of
those ideas. And this article will not repeat the materials in those titles. I
will point out here though that you can find the basics in the following of my
titles: (1) The Bible: The Good
Book and The Big Book; Why Early A.A. Succeeded (a Bible Study Primer); The James Club and the Original A.A.
Program’s Absolute Essentials; Twelve
Steps for You; The Good Book-Big Book
Guidebook; (2) The contents of Anne Smiths Journal:Anne Smith’s Journal, 1933-1939; (3) Quiet
Time:Good Morning: Quiet Time,
Morning Watch, Meditation, and Early A.A.; (4) The Oxford Group’s Life
Changing Twenty-Eight Ideas:The
Oxford Group and Alcoholics Anonymous; Henrietta
Seiberling: Ohio’s Lady with a Cause; (5) The teachings of Rev. Sam
Shoemaker:New Light on Alcoholism;
By the Power of God; (6) The
Christian literature they studied and circulated:Dr. Bob and His Library; The
Books Early AAs Read for Spiritual Growth; The Akron Genesis of Alcoholics Anonymous; That Amazing Grace; Making
Known the Biblical History and Roots of Early A.A. (7) The Akron
Elements from United Christian Endeavor Society:When Early AAs Were Cured and Why; The James Club supra; Making
Known supra; God and Alcoholism; Cured.

Today, you can find all of these
on amazon.com. You can find them on my website www.dickb.com/titles.shtml.
And you can find more and more on the eBooks we are slowly but surely
publishing as well.

Other basic ideas came from sources I have researched and which are covered in
numerous articles I have published on my websites. They are mentioned below in
connection with their sources. And they had a particularly great influence on
some of the language Bill used in the Big Book and in his other writings.

But that’s not what’s at issue here. Now, therefore, we’ll take a cursory look
at Twelve Well-Springs of A.A. They don’t fit in a nice timeline. They are not
particularly consistent, nor are they congruous. None of them can be found
ever-present in each of the various streams of A.A. from Akron, Cleveland, New
York, Sister Ignatia, Father Ralph Pfau, Ed Webster, Richmond Walker, Father Ed
Dowling, or Rev. Sam Shoemaker. They simply ought to be known as part of our
history.

To be brief, our history ought to be known so that recovering people can make
intelligent choices and appropriate decisions. So that they can apply those
historical ideas in present-day 12 Step Fellowships. Following, then, are the
major well-springs—some of great importance, some virtually unknown, and many conflicting
in meaning and emphasis.

Twelve Well-Springs as Sources of our Basic Ideas

Number One: The United
Christian Endeavor Society. Organized about the time of Dr. Bob’s birth.
Focused on the young people in a local Protestant Church which was supported by
the Christian Endeavor Group connected with that church. Producing almost all
of the major ideas that were carried over into early Akron A.A.’s Christian
Fellowship led by Dr. Bob. The ideas? Confession of Christ. Bible study. Prayer
meetings. Conversion meetings. Quiet Hours, topical discussions, reading of
religious literature, witness, and fellowship—all under the banner of “love and
service.” See The James Club and The
Early A.A. Program’s Absolute Essentials; The Good Book-Big Book Guidebook; Making Known the Biblical History and Roots of Early A.A.

Number Two: The Salvation Army. Organized under General William Booth
not long after Christian Endeavor and introducing ideas about working with
drunks and street criminals. Used in missions, observed by Ebby Thacher and
Bill Wilson, and exemplified by the practical program of early Akron A.A. The
ideas? Abstinence. Resisting Temptation. Confessing Jesus Christ. Relying on
the Creator. Elimination of sin. Employing the power of one saved and recovered
drunk to bring effectively to another still-suffering drunk the message of
salvation, love, and service to another still suffering drunk. Carrying the
message of salvation and questing for truth. Perpetuating the fellowship and
witnessing among the ranks of those already saved, recovered soldiers. See When Early AAs Were Cured and Why; The First Nationwide A.A. History
Conference.

Number Three: New Thought. Also beginning to take wing through the
impetus of Christian Science and similar movements that began to flower at
almost the same period as the first two sources. But the New Thought focus was
on a new kind of god—a higher power—that took descriptive words from the Bible
but saw God, good, and evil in non-salvation terms. New Thought words and phrases
like higher power, cosmic consciousness, fourth dimension, and Universal Mind
filtered in to the A.A. stream. The moving New Thought expositors included Mary
Baker Eddy, Waldo Trine, William James, Emmanuel Movement writers, and Emmet
Fox. See The Books Early AAs Read for
Spiritual Growth, 7th ed; When Early
AAs Were Cured and Why;Dr. Bob and
His Library; Good Morning: Quiet
Time, Morning Watch, Meditation, and Early A.A.; God and Alcoholism.

When it comes to New Thought
influences, three or four anti-A.A. Christian writers have muddled the scene
completely. First, they fail to discuss the early A.A. Christian Fellowship
founded in Akron – and carefully summarized in 7 points by Frank Amos in DR. BOB and the Good Oldtimers, 131. And
you won’t find New Thought there. Second, they fail to examine and compare the
sixteen practices of the Akron Christian Fellowship; and you won’t find New
Thought there as a practice, though you will find it among the dozens of other
non-New Thought pieces of reading looked at by Akron Pioneers. Third, they
ignore that early AAs adhered to the precepts of Hebrews 11:6, John 3:16,
Romans 10:9—all ideas totally rejected by the New Thought spokesman of the day—Emmet
Fox.

Number Four: Professor William James and the “spiritual experience.”
Just who is the author of Bill’s “spiritual experience” expression is not all
that clear. Though it certainly can be found in Oxford Group writings. Carl
Jung told Rowland Hazard that Rowland needed a “conversion” experience. Rowland
made a decision for Jesus Christ. Ebby Thacher made a decision for Jesus
Christ, and Bill Wilson made a decision for Jesus Christ. These do not seem to
be the “spiritual experiences” discussed in detail by James. William James
wrote Varieties of Religious Experience,
which Wilson believed validated his “blazing white flash” conversion experience
at Towns Hospital—which followed after Bill’s conversion at Calvary Mission.
See The Conversion of Bill W., www.dickb.com/conversion.shtml.
Sam Shoemaker wrote in his early book Realizing
Religion that people needed a “vital religious experience.” And Oxford
Group writings are surfeited with references to “spiritual experience” and
“spiritual awakening.” So are Shoemaker’s later books. Wilson liked to
attribute the spiritual experience idea to James and also claimed that James
authored the “deflation-at-depth” idea underlying A.A.’s First Step. Historian
Kurtz says he can’t find the latter in James’s book. I certainly can and did
and highlighted the point in my title Turning
Point: A History of Early A.A.’s Spiritual Roots and Successes.
www.dickb.com/Turning.shtml.

Number Five: The Oxford Group—A First Century Christian Fellowship. Not
really “organized” until about 1919 when the book Soul Surgery was first published. Primarily a movement which drew
its ideas from the life-changing Biblical concepts of Lutheran Minister Frank
N. D. Buchman. Each one of the aforementioned well-springs influenced the ideas
that were borrowed and adapted by the Akron program. And to these were added
catch-words and ideas that Buchman picked up along the way toward the group’s
actual existence. There were twenty-eight ideas in all that impacted
upon A.A.’s Big Book and Twelve Steps and existed in greater or lesser degree
in some of the practices in the earlier Akron Fellowship. The 28 ideas can be
summarized in eight groupings of the ideas Buchman adopted: (1) God—descriptions,
His plan, man’s duty, believing. (2) Sin—the blocks to God and others.
(3) Surrenders—the decision to surrender self and self-will to God’s
will. (4) Life-changing art—the Five C’s of the process moving from
Confidence to Confession to Conviction to Conversion to Continuance. (5) Jesus
Christ—His power, and the Four Absolute Standards. Sin was the problem.
Jesus Christ was the cure. And the result was a miracle, they said. (6) Growth
in fellowship through Quiet Time, Bible study, prayer, and seeking
Guidance. (7) Restitution—for the harms caused by sin. (8) Fellowship
and witness—working in teams loyal to Jesus Christ to change the lives of
others. See The Oxford Group and
Alcoholics Anonymous: A Design for Living That Works; The Akron Genesis of Alcoholics Anonymous;Turning Point: A History of the Spiritual Roots and Successes of Alcoholics
Anonymous.

Number Six: The teachings of Episcopalian priest Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker,
Jr. Sam teamed up with Frank Buchman about 1919, then began writing a
series of many books on the OG ideas and Sam’s Bible concepts. Sam,
headquartered his efforts at Calvary Church in New York, of which he became
Rector in 1925. It is fair to say that the most quoted, the most copied, and
the most persuasive influence on Bill Wilson and his Big Book approach came
directly from Shoemaker. To the point where Wilson actually asked Sam to write
the Twelve Steps, as to which Sam declined in favor of their being written by
an alcoholic, namely, Bill. See New Light
on Alcoholism: God, Sam Shoemaker, and A.A.; The First Nationwide A.A. History Conference; When Early AAs Were Cured and Why; By the Power of God

Number Seven: The conversion ideas of Dr. Carl Gustav Jung. Two or three
historians who have not really done their homework now claim that Jung had no
connection with A.A.’s beginnings. They assert that Jung never saw Rowland
Hazard as a patient and therefore the “conversion” solution so dominant in Bill
Wilson’s Big Book program did not come from Jung. But the skimpy research done
will not support any speculative, absurd conclusion that Jung, Rowland Hazard,
Ebby Thacher, Bill Wilson, and Sam Shoemaker all lied in order to conjure up a
solution. The real point is how badly Wilson missed the point of Jung’s idea of
conversion. Conversion, Jung said, was the solution for Rowland’s chronic
alcoholism. But conversion, to Jung, did not mean what the Bible describes as a
new birth and which Shoemaker and the Akronites were later espousing. The altar
call at Shoemaker’s Calvary Mission was not the conversion idea Jung had in
mind. See New Light on Alcoholism: God,
Sam Shoemaker, and A.A.; Twelve Steps
for You;The Good Book-Big Book
Guidebook.

Number Eight: The medical ideas of Dr. William D. Silkworth. Once again,
historians who have not really done their homework now sometimes claim that Dr.
Silkworth did not originate the ideas about alcoholism as a disease. And there
is evidence that the disease concept may well not have originated with
Silkworth. But there is equally strong evidence that it was Silkworth who
spelled out for Bill Wilson the idea that Wilson was suffering from a mental
obsession and a physical allergy—however the details were or would be
characterized in the disease arena. Virtually unmentioned is Silkworth’s
belief—explained to Bill Wilson and other patients—that Jesus Christ, the
“Great Physician,” could cure them of alcoholism. See The Good Book-Big Book Guidebook; The Positive Power of Jesus Christ; The Little Doctor Who Loved Drunks: William D. Silkworth Biography.

Number Nine: The lay therapy ideas of Richard Peabody. Dr. Bob and Bill
Wilson both owned and studied The Common Sense
of Drinking—a book by lay therapist Richard Peabody. And though Peabody
died drunk, Wilson somehow saw fit to adopt almost verbatim certain words and
phrases from the Peabody book. Among the two most unfortunate derivates were:
(1) There is no cure for alcoholism. (2) Once an alcoholic always an alcoholic.
Both concepts flew in the face of a decade of declarations by the early AAs and
their observers that they had found a cure for alcoholism that rested on the
power of Jesus Christ. This was not something Peabody embraced. And how Wilson
got switched from God to incurable illness on the basis of the writings of a
lay therapist who died drunk is currently a mystery to me. See Richard Peabody.
The Common Sense of Drinking; Cured: Proven Help for Alcoholics and Addicts;
When Early AAs Were Cured and Why.

Number Ten: The Biblical Emphasis from Dr. Bob’s youth and Christian
Endeavor. A.A. detractors and doctrinaire Christians who dislike the Oxford Group seem impelled
to claim that A.A. came from the Oxford Group, that the Oxford Group was an
heretical cult, and that its very existence was an example of what A.A. wasn’t,
rather than what it was. And their canards are so heavily entrenched in
religious and recovery thinking and writing they may never be dispelled. But
they are fallacious and utterly misleading. It is quite true that Bill Wilson’s
Big Book and Twelve Step program embraced almost every Oxford Group idea, while
Bill Wilson was busy denying the fact. But the early Akron program, which
produced the 75 to 93% success rates, really had very little to do with Oxford
Group missions, principles, and practices. The Akron focus was on
abstinence—not an Oxford Group idea; hospitalization—not an Oxford Group idea;
resisting temptation—not an Oxford Group idea; accepting Jesus Christ as Lord
and Saviour—not an Oxford Group mandate; relying on the Creator for strength
and guidance—a universal idea undoubtedly embraced by the Oxford Group; Bible
study meetings—not an Oxford Group emphasis; old-fashioned prayer meetings—not
an Oxford Group practice; Quiet Time—a universal idea which pre-dated the
Oxford Group and was a big item in the YMCA and in Christian Endeavor;
religious comradeship—not an Oxford Group idea; favored church attendance—not
an Oxford Group idea; love and service as a banner—not an Oxford Group
expression, but a Christian Endeavor word of art; working with others—not an
Oxford Group emphasis when it came to alcoholism, nor was it particularly a
Christian Endeavor idea except as to witnessing and conversion. By contrast,
the simple Christian Endeavor program appears to represent the heart of what
Akron did and what it was reported in official A.A. literature to have done.
That program was not incorporated in the Big Book, but it is reported fully by
Frank Amos reports to John D. Rockefeller, Jr. that are part of A.A.’s
conference approved literature. See my titles The First Nationwide A.A. History Conference; The Good Book and The Big Book: A.A.’s Roots in the Bible; Why Early A.A. Succeeded (A Bible study
primer); The Good Book-Big Book Guidebook;
and The James Club and The Early A.A.
Program’s Absolute Essentials.

Number Eleven: The practical records and teachings of Dr. Bob’s Wife.
How A.A. could have buried Anne Smith’s role, her importance, and her spiritual
journal is a complete mystery to me. The facts about Anne’s importance would
stand by themselves if she had never even written her 9 year journal. Bill
Wilson and many pioneers called Anne the “Mother of A.A.” AAs were housed in
her home from the beginning, and those AAs got well. AAs were fed in her home,
and it became the first real “half-way” house after prior hospitalization. Anne
read the Bible to A.A.’s founders and to the many who followed them. Anne
conducted a morning quiet time each morning at the Dr. Bob’s Home where she led
a group of AAs and their families in Bible study, prayer, listening, and
topical discussions. Anne counseled and nursed and taught alcoholics; and her
work with newcomers in meetings was legendary. They were her special focus. Her
journal records every principle and concept that is part of the A.A.
picture—Biblical emphasis, prayer, Quiet Time, Guidance, literature
recommended, Oxford Group principles and practices, and practical guides to
working with alcoholics. It seems likely that she not only shared the contents
of this journal—written between 1933 and 1939—with Bill Wilson, but also that
Bill took many of his Oxford Group and other expressions directly from Anne’s
Journal. If so, the fact has never been mentioned. See Anne Smith’s Journal, 1933-1939;The Akron Genesis of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Number Twelve: The Devotionals and Christian Literature Read and Circulated.
We know that A.A.’s basic ideas came from the Bible. The Book of James, Jesus’s
Sermon on the Mount, and 1 Corinthians 13 were frequently read aloud and
studied and were considered absolutely essential. And AAs studied literature
that underlined these roots—books on the Sermon by Oswald Chambers, Glenn
Clark, Harry Emerson Fosdick, Emmet Fox, and E. Stanley Jones. Devotionals discussing
concepts from the Book of James—The
Runner’s Bible, The Upper Room, My Utmost for His Highest, Daily Strength for
Daily Needs. Commentaries on 1 Corinthians 13 by Henry Drummond and
Toyohiko Kagawa. And various other concepts were fleshed out through the
literature of Shoemaker on all aspects of the Bible, prayer, guidance, Quiet
Time, and so on. So also in the many Oxford Group books on these subjects—Soul Surgery (and the Five C’s), Quiet Time,The Guidance of God, Realizing
Religion, For Sinners Only, When Man Listens, and so on. In
addition, there were prayer guides and Bible study guides and healing guides
galore—in Dr. Bob’s Library and circulated by him to others. The whole picture
can be found in my titles: The Books
Early AAs Read for Spiritual Growth, 7th edition; Making Known the Biblical History and Roots of A.A.; Anne Smith’s Journal; The Akron Genesis of Alcoholics Anonymous;Dr. Bob and His Library.

The Whole Picture

As Father Paul Blaes, Ph.D., the
Roman Catholic theologian who endorsed my Turning
Point book wrote so well, there was a
lacuna in A.A. history when I began 21 years ago. A lacuna is a gap, a
hole. And Father Blaes had observed for himself the gaping vacuum in accounts
of our history. He therefore welcomed and endorsed my comprehensive history.

When I began, I thought the only missing elements were descriptions of how the
Bible was used and what the Oxford Group program really was. And there were plenty of gaps there. But this was
just the tip of the iceberg. A.A. literature said Dr. Bob’s library had been
given away. Yet I discovered about half of it in his daughter’s attic and
tracked down the other half to his son’s home in Nocona, Texas. And without
these books, you just couldn’t know what early AAs were reading and concluding.
Next, I discovered that Anne Smith’s Journal had simply never been mentioned in
A.A. history accounts; yet you could find the whole program there. And, thanks
to Dr. Bob’s daughter and A.A.’s archivist Frank Mauser, I was permitted to get
a complete copy and publish my book on Anne Smith. Then, when I began with the
Oxford Group, it was at the suggestion of Frank Mauser, that I wrote my Oxford
Group book; and over the years I found hundreds of their books, encountered an
intense interest among its leaders in my work, and then realized the whole Big
Book program was essentially Oxford Group—something broadly suggested in Joe
and Charlie Big Book Seminars. From there I went to the Akron story and
realized the importance and differences regarding the early Christian
Fellowship there. I tracked down the history and wrote the Akron story.
Learning there the importance of the Bible, I tackled the Biblical roots and am
only now getting the entire picture together—the words in A.A. from the Bible,
the prayers in A.A. from the Bible, the slogans in A.A. from the Bible, and
then the immense study of the Bible that AAs did in the Book of James, Sermon
on the Mount, and 1 Corinthians 13. Even that, however, was not the end. I
stumbled upon Christian Endeavor and began to realize that the whole Akron
program was far more founded on Christian Endeavor principles and practices
than on those of the Oxford Group. Piece by piece, other details emerged. There
was the whole Shoemaker story and my discovery that the words in the Big Book
and even the Steps were largely Shoemaker words and that Sam had been asked to
write the Twelve Steps, but declined. More? Yes. More on Carl Jung. More on
William James. More on Richard Peabody. More on William D. Silkworth. More on
Henrietta Seiberling. More on Clarence Snyder. More on the Wilson manuscripts.
More on the deleted materials. More. More. More.

It didn’t add up to the whole picture, or even part of the picture. And the gap
had left alkies to their own devices in fashioning substitutes. When Bill
dumped the Oxford Group in the East, the Oxford Group details were omitted.
When Bob and Anne died, the Bible in A.A. died with them. When Clarence Snyder
got on the wrong side of Bill Wilson, the Snyder legacy disappeared until
recently. When Henrietta Seiberling was put on the shelf, the reprimands about
phony spirituality, séances, substitute psychology, and sick thinking were
shelved along with her futile protests. People began denying the date of Dr.
Bob’s sobriety; and they’re doing it even more. People began denying that Jung
saw Rowland Hazard; and they’re doing it even more. People just never even
seemed to want to know about Anne Smith nor the early books nor the Bible
verses nor the Sam Shoemaker story nor the devotionals. Who are the “people?”
Merely those who write about our history, but don’t survey and report the many
items mentioned here.

Too much religion seemed to be the cry. That from those studying a program so
obviously religious at its beginnings and so obviously religious today that one
court after another has ruled that way and rejected the “spirituality” ruse.
For what it is worth, A.A. is a “religion,” most have ruled. But it is the
facts, and not the nomenclature, that need the light of day.

There’s a lot more. But cheer up. I’ve been able to field 42 published titles,
750 articles, 75 audio talks, seminars at the Wilson House, a talk “near” the
Minneapolis convention, several large history conferences and cruises, and
three websites where freedom of speech abounds and frequent visits have added
up to over 3,540,000 these days. Others interested in history are beginning to
let the cats out of the bags. Plural. Plural cats. Plural bags. Good stuff has just
begun to come out about the real Dr. Silkworth. Good stuff has already come out
about Clarence Snyder. Interesting too are facts emerging from the Lois Wilson
stories. Some have dared to mention Bill Wilson’s LSD experiments with his
wife, Nell Wing, Father Dowling, and others. Also his spiritualism sessions at
Stepping Stones. Also his womanizing and squabbles over his estate. Also his
obsession with psychic phenomena, Niacin, and book sales. Also the deadening
effect his years of severe depressions had on A.A. ideas and historical
accuracy. And then the vain attempts to link A.A. with Masonry, New Age, and
even John Wesley and St. Francis. And more. Those facts may be part of the
founders’ scene, but they hardly reflect the facts about either pioneer A.A. or
Big Book A.A.

For a long time, I felt the foregoing didn’t belong in the picture. They had to
do with Bill rather than A.A. I thought. In fact, at Stepping Stones, I was
asked to bypass the files on drugs and spooks; and I did. Yet I found that
others had trod that route and even published on it in A.A.’s “Pass It On.” Then I discovered the
missing records on Shoemaker at the Episcopal Archives in Texas. And resource
and its loss, bypass, and pilfering had been was a tragic historical impediment
because several had tried to research them, couldn’t find them, and were
astonished at the gap. Some assumed they didn’t exist. But they did and do, I
believe. And are these things part of the whole picture?

I certainly think so, but not the picture I’m interested in. I was and am
focused on helping the newcomer through our great A.A. Fellowship. I am focused
on the importance of God, His Son Jesus Christ, and the Bible in early A.A. and
their applicability to recovery today. I was and am focused on discovering
every aspect of the recovery program that was used in Akron, and then in
Cleveland, and then in the Big Book, and then by the host of writers who
emerged during Bill’s 1943-1955 depression period. It’s what worked that
counts. It’s accuracy that counts. It’s the complete picture that counts. And
it’s the relevance to our getting sober, getting well, getting delivered from
the power of darkness, and loving and serving our Heavenly Father that count.

I think the last 25 years have not only unplugged twelve well-springs; they’ve
started the streams flowing. And I don’t think the onrush will stop. The
information age is upon us. So is the transportation age. So too is the search
for applicable facts.

About Me

Richard G. Burns holds a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree from Stanford University where he was Case Editor of the Stanford Law Review. He was a Phi Beta Kappa in his Junior Year at UC Berkeley. There he received an A.A. degree in economics with Honorable Mention. He was an Information and Education Specialist in the United States Army where he held the rank of Sgt. He attended the information-education school at Washington & Lee University. He practiced law in California from 1951 to 1986. He was president of the Corte Madera Chamber of Commerce, Corte Madera Center Merchants Council, Mill Valley Community Church, Redwoods Retirement Center, and Almonte District Improvemen Club. Also elected Director of the Almonte Sanitary District. He is a writer, historian, retired attorney, Bible student, CDAAC, and active recovered member of the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous with continuous sobriety beginning April 21, 1986.

He writes under the pen name Dick B. He has devoted 24 years to researching the history and successes of the early A.A. Christian Fellowship in Akron; and published 46 titles, more than 1450 articles, and materials on Facebook, Twitter, MauiHistorian.Blogspot.com, Alcoholics Anonymous History.com, In the Rooms, Linked-in, Tumbler, MauiHistorian.Word Press.com, Aa Historian WordPress.com, AA History with Dick B. on cyber recovery social, Dick B. YouTube Channel, Articles Base, GoArticles.com, SearchWarp, Self Growth Experts, Social network forums on International Christian Recovery Coalition Forums, Recovery Internet Fellowship, Cyber Recovery, Daily Recovery, Christian Recovery Ministries, radio, TV, and over 70 audio blogs on the history subject. He regularly conducts radio interviews of Christian Recovery Leaders and Workers on www.ChristianRecoveryRadio.com.

He is Executive Director of the International Christian Recovery Coalition and of Freedom Ranch Maui Incorporated. He is an Advisor to God's Way Ministry, a Christian Church and is also a consultant to Wyoming Pacific Oil Company. Listed in Marquis Who's Who in the World, Who's Who in America, Who's Who in Law, Who's Who in Finance, and Gale's Contemporary Authors